The present invention relates to a device for automatically moving vehicles along guide ways of lifts.
Lifts have long been used for interventions on vehicles of various kinds, which have a structure composed of two horizontal and parallel guide ways supported by a frame that moves vertically in order to lift the vehicles loaded onto said guide ways and to access the underside of said vehicles or their lower region, for example the parts linked to the wheels.
When vehicles are located on said lifts, it is often necessary to move them systematically back and forth, albeit over short distances, in order to perform the required tests.
This is the case for example when the wheel trim is checked, i.e. of the so-called toe-in.
To perform this test, after placing the vehicle on the lift, the operators actually apply the measurement instruments to the wheels of said vehicle and, in order to check their correct placement, they move said vehicle by pushing it manually along the guide ways in order to check that the orientation of the instruments does not change as the wheels turn; if it did, it would yield incorrect measurement values.
The effort to be exerted for these movements is considerable, because in the specific case the lift is in the raised position and the operator has to act upward from below.
Moreover, this effort is clearly linked to the size of the vehicle and must be repeated many times during a working day.
The aim of the present invention is to eliminate the drawbacks of the known art by providing a device for automatically moving vehicles along guide ways of lifts that allows operators to perform any necessary movement without acting manually and therefore without any effort.
Within this aim, an object of the present invention is to solve said aim with a structure that is simple and easy to provide in practice, safe in use, effective in operation, relatively low in cost and applicable both to newly manufactured lifts and to existing lifts.
This aim and this and other objects are all achieved by the present device for automatically moving vehicles along guide ways of lifts, characterized in that it is constituted by a pusher carriage that can be moved horizontally by way of corresponding means on a guide that can be fixed longitudinally to at least one of said guide ways and is provided with at least one means that clamps at least one wheel of a vehicle in the pushing configuration and retracts in the inactive configuration.